California

César Antonio Pérez is the Restorative Justice Coordinator at LMEC in San Diego, CA, USA. He has worked as Testing Coordinator and Resource Teacher planning and monitoring student achievement. César believes that every child deserves a quality education...

Gustavo Luna, a first-generation college graduate, immigrant, and a dual language learner from a low-socioeconomic background, attributes his academic and professional success to mentors and educators. They provided life changing opportunities, guided his...

As a first generation college student from an immigrant family residing in the low income community of South El Monte, Jesús Mendoza defied the odds of young Chicanos accessing and graduating from a 4 year institution. He earned a Bachelor of Science...

Sue Demko is a physical education teacher at the San Diego School District. During her first years she taught as an elementary teacher in kindergarten and fifth grade, and has since transitioned into teaching middle school PE. The school Demko is teaching...

Dr. Michael Vea is a Senior Director at the San Diego Unified School District, co-leading the design of California’s first-of-its-kind prenatal-to-12th grade public Montessori School in San Diego’s Logan Heights community. He began his career in education...

Michael is a system-level strategist committed to transforming public education, especially for the most marginalized student populations. In his first job after college, Michael co-directed the opening of 25 after-school programs in four public school...

Dr. Adriana Chavarín-López is the daughter of Mexican immigrant parents that always stressed to her the value of an education. Inspired by her teachers and principal at Harborside Elementary School (Chula Vista, CA), Adriana knew from an early age that...

Dr. Johanna Barmore is a School Improvement Facilitator at WestEd. She is responsible for providing coaching and consulting to schools, districts, and state departments of education around school improvement, mathematics instruction, standards-based...